To take DD to the GP because she is short?

[WeetabixTowels]

Through the summer hols DS (6) has shot up height wise. He doesn’t fit into anything he was wearing at the start of the summer. He’s tall for his age.

He is now only slightly shorter than DD (10). Same parents, neither of us are especially short (I’m 5’6 DH 5’7). She finishes her plate after every meal. Eating isn’t a problem. She drinks the recommended amount of water a day. No health problems.

But she’s only 125cm tall. The height of a 7yo. She’s only grown a few inches in 2 years. She’s wearing the same clothes she did when she was 8. I’m actually worried - why isn’t she growing!

Would it be completely neurotic and batshit crazy to take her to the GP?

No it would be an entirely sensible and appropriate thing to do. Some kids are late developers and will have a growth spurt after puberty but it’s also possible there is a hormonal or thyroid issue which is delaying her growth and needs to be treated. You need to rule that out.

Have you tried plotting her growth to see what centile she is on ? Has she always been tiny. She's maybe just petit.

Where is she on the growth charts? Both of mine are 0.25 (as am I) which seems to trigger an automatic referral to paeds for blood tests, tests of bone density, and endocrinology tests. They are fine just have 'short stature' (this is a thing!).

If concerned I would talk to your GP. The tests are straightforward, non invasive and have been performed readily for my otherwise healthy children

Having just done this - she’s on the 2nd centile.

She wasn’t a small baby. She was 8lbs when she was born and she grew normally until about school age where she’s just grown really slowly

If she’d always been tiny then it wouldn’t be a concern (your DH is not especially short but is on the smaller end of the scale).

However if she had been a more average height but has largely stopped growing then yes I would speak to doctors. Thyroid checks, iron levels etc.

My daughter is 13 and still much smaller than her peers. I started to notice when she was about 5 but wasn’t too concerned at the time, but by the time she was in year 6 she had started to notice herself - especially as her teacher would make them stand in a line height order and she was always last! I made an appointment with our GP and we were referred to the hospital where she had bone X-rays, blood, height and weight. Basically she is just growing much slower so her consultant is reluctant to give her any hormones at this stage, we’ve been told she should reach about 5 5 in height.

Take her in. It may be nothing but it could be something and they will certainly check.

I have one who has always been small and goes for a growth check every year. (I am short and from a family of short people; DH is average height from a family of average and short people, so a tall child would be a shock.) Mine has always been deemed okay at each check because he grows along his line. It’s the .4 line of all lines, but somebody has to be the shortest centile just how someone has to be the tallest! They check him each year to be sure he’s still ticking along, especially as he also has an allergy and a slightly different diet to most kids as a result.

It’s a really easy appointment where they will measure height and weight, ask you some questions about how she eats and what she eats, and then they will probably ask you to come back in 6 months to check for growth. If you can fill in anything by marks you’ve plotted on a wall or even pictures that might show the same item of clothing over time so you could see if it looks identical or if sleeves were getting shorter etc, all that sort of thing can help.

For context, my 9yo is 120cm and has one appointment a year just to keep tabs on the situation.

Your dh is only 9th to 25th percentile.
And your dd 2nd. But it does sound like shes dropped

I would think it's worth asking. It's not so much that she is short that's worrying you by the sound things, but that you are concerned she isn't growing.
It would do no harm to get her seen.
I have 2 boys who are 2 years different in age and at one point when they were around 18 months and 3.5 years old people kept asking me if they were twins because they were so close in size. I also felt stupid going to the doctor but he agreed it was worth looking into annd referred us to a paediatrician. In the end they decided he was just small, nothing to worry about and that things would even out in time. And indeed now they are young adults, they are both pretty average. But the paediatrician said I was absolutely right to have gone to see them because in a certain percentage of cases there is a hormone problem or something and it can be fairly easily managed if identified early so it's better to be safe than sorry.
You've got a concern and there is nothing wrong with seeking advice. If there's nothing wrong, you'll be reassured and if there's something that needs to be treated then the sooner you get the ball rolling the better.

Every now and again I get an advert on FB, and think I've seen it on TV too, that encourages you to get your child checked if you think their growth has slowed down.

Your husband is sort of short for a man, so she may just be short.
But maybe just have her checked.

I would absolutely seek a referral, not least because with girls, once they start their periods, growth pretty much stops completely so if she started her period in, say, a year, she'd be largely stuck at this height.

Be warned however, that even if you have a great Gp who will happily refer you, paediatric endochronologists via the NHS aren't exactly a dime a dozen, so it might take a while for the referral.

If she's dropping centiles then yes, I would get it checked out. I was told its fine to be small or big, so long as they largely follow the same line on the graph. It never hurts to check.

once they start their periods, growth pretty much stops completely

Really not true, there’s usually another 2-3 years and 2-3 inches after periods start

This is precisely what the GP is for, to check whether someone is healthy and developing as they should. I would take her.

Your DH is short so maybe she takes after him.

You could get her checked out - but I would pass the info to the doctors in advance to explain why you are there so that you don't have to have the conversation about why exactly you are there in front of the child.

Also - do note that if she has any skill for, and interest in, acting she could be in demand as a child actor - they're not allowed to act under age 9 so agents are always looking for children under a certain height. For example Matilda at the West End has to be under 4ft3.

It may be that she takes after her dad, as 5’7” is quite short for a man, but it would probably be worth checking.

heights in families can vary so much. My kids are both adults in their 20s
dh 6’
me 5’8
ds 6’2”
dd 5’2

dd looks tiny alongside us, but put her beside the woman in dh’s mum’s side of the family, and she blends in perfectly with them

I was told by both the GP and the endocrinologist that the concern with DD having early puberty signs is that growth slows down and stops - not overnight, but that basically, she won't gain a LOT after she gets her period as at that point the bones start to fuse.

Having said that, that's not to say your "couple of inches" isn't true - but it's also largely completely unhelpful in this case. Let's say the child grows another inch before her period starts. Then she grows another 2 inches after that. She would then be 133cm as an adult. Which is very very short by any measure.

In DD's case, she's currently 130cm. If her period had arrived now, I would not want her to find herself stuff at less than 140cm. It's a genuine issue.

He is, he isn’t the shortest man I’ve ever known but certainly shorter than my former conquests 🤣

I think a PP hit the nail on the head - it’s actually not about being short but it’s the fact her growing has slowed down. And some days I honestly can’t fill her enough with food! She eats like a teenage boy.

She’s also developed a breast bud over the summer which makes me think that some of her is growing but some pf her isnt

worth discussing but it wouldn’t overly bother me at this age

I’m 5ft 1”
dd1 5ft 7” - 21
dd2 5ft 2” -19
dd3 5ft 3” - 15

dd’s 1 & 3 look alike and are the same build, dd2 looks like me and is short like me!

I stopped growing at age 12 (I was considered tall the ) and my periods didn’t arrive til I was nearly 15!

Take her, my parents took me despite being very short themselves and I ended up being diagnosed with a genetic short limb condition

I was tiny and skinny as a kid and my parents had me checked with bone scans, etc. Conclusion was, as it usually is, that I was a perfectly healthy late developer. I topped out at a small but normal 5'2". My periods also didn't start until 16, which suited me fine. Go and see the GP and take it from there.

My DD is very tall for her age (6'1" at 13).

She had blood tests when she was younger to rule out genetic conditions followed later by bone scans (wrist) which can determine bone age and give a likely prediction of future growth. Her bone age at 13 was actually 15 and the consultant concluded she had almost certainly reached full adult height. If bone age is older than chronological age, you have less growing time left, if it's younger, you have more time left.